A wide range of different perfumes are used as ingredients for many commercially available products, especially toiletries. Where a perfume is dominated by a scent originating from any single, readily identifiable source (for example a citrus fruit such as lemon), many users can normally easily recognise the scent.
However, many perfumes comprise a complex blend of various different ingredients, some of which produce very subtle scents. Few people are able, without special training, to identify individual scents in such perfumes, and therefore find it difficult to associate perfumes with the varied and (sometimes) rather obscure descriptions often provided on the packaging of the perfumes. Consequently, many people tend to select a new perfume on a “trial and error” basis.